<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>familiarity by keijitrash</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25920283">familiarity</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/keijitrash/pseuds/keijitrash'>keijitrash</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Haikyuu!!</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Fluff, Homesickness, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Iwaizumi Has Low Alcohol Tolerance, M/M, Musician Semi Eita, Not Beta Read</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 03:41:13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,013</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25920283</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/keijitrash/pseuds/keijitrash</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>iwaizumi hajime and semi eita meet five hours away from miyagi, in a bar where the former setter of shiratorizawa is performing in. it just so happens that tonight, iwaizumi misses home.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Iwaizumi Hajime &amp; Semi Eita, Iwaizumi Hajime/Semi Eita</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>28</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>familiarity</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>birthday gift for <a href="https://twitter.com/fufuhajime">jo</a> on twitter!! i hope you enjoy this mein &lt;3</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>
  <strong>i.<br/>
a homesick man walks into a bar</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>Iwaizumi Hajime misses home.</p><p>                                                     </p><p>He misses the fresh air whenever he steps out of the house, neighbors whose names he’s known since he was little; his friends who all decided to stay in their prefecture except for Oikawa who’d flown out of Japan...</p><p> </p><p>Going to Tokyo to study had been a dream he’s had since high school – but doing it now makes him wonder if he should’ve done things like everybody else.</p><p> </p><p>Maybe he should’ve stayed.</p><p> </p><p>That would've been easier.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>It’s sometime after ten in the evening when Iwaizumi decides to step out.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The streets are still bustling with people coming and going, and he thinks maybe he should’ve stayed home tonight – but home right now is suffocating.</p><p> </p><p>(Home is a four-walled, barely decorated room overlooking the streets below.)</p><p> </p><p>(It’s piled up works for university and other responsibilities that he doesn’t want to face right now.)</p><p> </p><p>(Home is deafening silence and being alone.)</p><p> </p><p>So he lets his feet take him to nowhere and anywhere – leading him to a bar in one of the less-busier spots of the capital. One that has a neon sign hanging above the door with an indiscernible word flickering on and off every few seconds and a bass-heavy song coming from a single speaker outside.</p><p> </p><p>Iwaizumi enters the place before he could think twice.</p><p>
  
</p><p>
  <strong>ii.<br/>
a vocalist recognizes a homesick man</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>A lot has changed for Semi Eita. He’d list them all if he remembered every detail, but most evident ones are these:</p><p> </p><p>1) The length of his hair,</p><p> </p><p>2) His newly pierced ears that feel hot and irritated whenever he unconsciously touches them and</p><p> </p><p>3) The fact that he went from playing volleyball for a well-known Academy to playing in a band for a practically unknown club in middle-of-nowhere Tokyo.</p><p> </p><p>And no, he isn’t homeless or anything. In fact, he lives in a clean apartment close to the university he’s in with an extra bedroom that he plans on putting up for rent. This gig is just him, in his own words, <em>pursuing other passions</em>.</p><p> </p><p>(By that he means recently getting into music, impulsively buying and learning the guitar, and spontaneously joining a band.)</p><p> </p><p>It’s fun, despite what his mom would say (“You’re wasting your time!”), and Semi actually likes it – playing music on for strangers who enjoy it just like him. He even gets free drinks on the house and nameless people with blurry faces telling him about their day!</p><p> </p><p>Then he spots a not-so-stranger in tonight’s crowd and thinks of two things simultaneously.</p><p> </p><p>First is <em>oh wow it’s Seijoh’s ace</em>, and the second is <em>oh shit it’s someone from Miyagi.</em></p><p> </p><p>The second thought overpowers the first, and he finds himself excited to get off the stage even more than entering it earlier.</p><p>
  
</p><p>
  <strong>iii.<br/>
a homesick man approaches a vocalist</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>When Iwaizumi sees the band’s vocalist, he feels his brain itch. He <em>knows</em> this person; has seen him before and has their name stored somewhere in the back of his head. He just can’t be sure from all the purple and blue light on stage.</p><p> </p><p>The vocalist sings the last line of the song and gives a parting wave to the crowd.</p><p> </p><p>Iwaizumi realizes who it is.</p><p> </p><p>“Semi!”</p><p> </p><p>(He did <em>not</em> mean to shout his name.)</p><p> </p><p>Shiratorizawa’s former setter leaves the stage with the rest of his band and walk straight to the bar counter for drinks. Iwaizumi has no idea what pushed him to leave his seat and walk towards him.</p><p> </p><p>(The answer is simple: alcohol. That and his <em>need</em> to just be with something, or <em>someone</em> in this case, who’s familiar to him.)</p><p> </p><p>(Who’s from <em>home</em>.)</p><p>
  
</p><p>
  <strong>iv.<br/>
a homesick man gets drunk</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>All of his nervousness upon seeing Seijoh’s ace dissipates when Iwaizumi tries for casual talk and ends up stumbling on his own words. Semi invites him to take the empty stool by his side and asks how things have been with a snicker.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s good,” Iwaizumi says, slurring, “it’s pretty good. Tokyo’s nice. Way more crowded than Miyagi. More people than Miyagi. <em>God</em>—I miss Miyagi, don’t you?”</p><p> </p><p>Semi laughs. “Sometimes.” He takes a sip of his drink before continuing: “It’s fun not knowing people here, but that makes things hard too.”</p><p> </p><p>Iwaizumi agrees and has no idea why he’s laughing.</p><p> </p><p>(Again – <em>alcohol</em>. He has surprisingly low tolerance when he looks like he could outdo a lot of people.)</p><p> </p><p>“I’m glad you’re here,” the former wing spiker suddenly blurts out, surprising both Semi and himself. He doesn’t take it back though, even when he had the perfect opportunity a second after he said those words.</p><p> </p><p>Not because he’s too drunk for it, but because he <em>does</em> mean it.</p><p> </p><p>He <em>is</em> glad that coincidence brought them together.</p><p> </p><p>“I feel like you’ve had a little too much to drink, ace.” Semi excuses himself from his band and stands to help his old opponent up. He slips an arm under the spiker’s and hefts him up from the stool. “You better be coherent enough to give directions to your place because I’m not bringing you to mine.”</p><p> </p><p>Iwaizumi <em>giggles</em>.</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>v.<br/>
a vocalist brings a homesick man home</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>Iwaizumi <em>was</em> coherent enough to give directions. But what he <em>wasn’t</em> was stable enough to wait till he got to his apartment’s bathroom to puke.</p><p> </p><p>(Semi pretends not to know him while he emptied the contents of his stomach in a trash can.)</p><p> </p><p>“Can you stay?” Iwaizumi manages to say while Semi was filling up a glass for him to gurgle. The setter glances back at him before going ‘eh’ and saying, “Fine.”</p><p> </p><p>Iwaizumi tries for a smile, but makes it look more like a grimace.</p><p> </p><p>Semi holds back a laugh.</p><p> </p><p>“Head to bed,” he tells him with a roll of his eyes, “I’ll get you aspirin when you wake up.”</p><p> </p><p>Iwaizumi surprisingly does what he’s asked without complaints. But as he walked from the sink to his room, he says: “I really am glad you’re here.”</p><p> </p><p>Semi’s heart warms a little at the sentiment.</p><p> </p><p>Then: “You remind me of home.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>thank you so much for reading! i'd love to hear your thoughts on this and, if you want more, i write way more often on <a href="https://twitter.com/wyannyin">twitter</a> so check that out too!</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>